‘Well, by stretchin’ a trifle you might call her a gold mine—just a little claim by myself. Southeast a ways and high up. You go to San Forenso first. You can look back into California and down into Sonora from my diggin’s.’
‘Do you have horses up at the mine?’ Elbert asked, thinking of the Pitcairn stock-saddle.
The quaint laugh sounded. ‘Just a little vanity, young man. They do say Bob Leadley would have his saddle-hoss, if he was runnin’ a canal boat. I can’t seem to do proper without a bit of hoss-flesh handy, though Mamie sure costs me no end money and trouble, not bein’ the sort of hoss as can pick her livin’ off the north side o’ trees—’
He paused, as if pleased to recall the mare to mind in minutest detail.
‘Mamie’s father was the stake-hoss, Ganopol—one of the first ten runners, they do say, and bone and blood to go with it, if not a whole lot of hoss-sense essential. Mamie’s mother was just a cow hoss ... just a cow hoss, with a little clock workin’ between her eyes—that was Clara. Thirteen years, I had her, and we got real domesticated together, you might say. Mamie’s a five-year-old now—just about growed up—don’t resemble neither parent none, bein’ a jewel box by herself, full of her own little knick-knacks.... Yep, bred right out of the purple royalty on one hand and the black sage on the other, but approachin’ my idea of saddle-hoss, plumb satisfyin’—
‘An’ p’raps it ain’t such a chore, as I’m makin’ out, to get hay and grain up to the mine,’ Mr. Leadley added, ‘because once or twice a year, Mort Cotton sends his mule train up from San Forenso to pack down my ore. Takes just about a week’s work, three times a year, for a dozen or fourteen mules; and ’stead of the train pilin’ back uptrail with empty riggin’s, I stock up the cabin and the corral. Makes it easy, but a whole lot of times, I don’t know where to put all I got—’
‘But what do you do with your mare when you leave the mine?’ Elbert asked.
‘Leave her with Mort Cotton at his ranch in San Forenso. All hands have got to know her at Mort’s.’
After supper they strolled back to the Plaza. The band began playing ‘La Paloma.’ Elbert started to speak, but Mr. Leadley’s hand tightened on his knee for silence.
‘I’ve got reason to remember that piece,’ he said, when it was over. ‘The Mexicans never get tired of it. It’s like the Virgin speaking to them. Do you know what that word means?’